Smart Village Fibre Installation in Jackal Creek

[Stillie]

Hi guys,

If you are wondering I will be giving updates on the Smart Village installation for the fibre into my complex.

Currently the max speed for the complex has been increased to 20mbps and there are plans of that speed increasing. In my previous post I was fuming because the max speed was 10mbps which i am happy taking (and am taking.....for now). The reason for the anger initially was that for 10mbps up and down was going to cost R999 which was insane, but last week Thursday i was told by an insider that the new pricing will be release VERY soon. The next day (Friday) he mailed me and told me I can get 10mbps uncapped symmetrical fibre for R599. So i jumped at it and ordered it on Friday.

In the complex there already is the fibre in the place I am staying. See the pics below:

The fibre comes directly into NTD? (Not sure if thats the correct name for it - maybe someone can correct me)


On the other side of the lounge there are these 2 ports, I don't know if NTD port is connected to the NTD because if I plug a LAN cable into it to a Wireless AP the light, lights up. Yet the NTD is not powered so I am sceptical as to where this "data" port goes to.


I applied for the fibre on the site like i was ordering food or something. Simple forms, not needing any banking details or anything (which i thought was weird but we will see if they want more docs later on)

Yesterday I called and chatted to a lovely lady on the other side just to find out if everything is in order because of the lack of documentation they needed when ordering it. I gave her my order number which i received immediately after applying for it. She said that I will have fibre with in 5 (Working im guessing) days of placing the order because she said it will be up and running by Friday (this week)

So I am currently waiting for some sort of communication from Smart Village regarding my installation, whether it be from a Tech wanting to know when they can install my fibre or from a Sales person wanting more info.

Will keep you posted.

P.S. I remember seeing someone else (in the same complex as me) having the same issues regarding the fibre pricing at Jackal Creek which i totally understand, but maybe someone can see this post and realize the pricing has changed and maybe they can also apply for the fibre.

 

[Pho3nix]

/subs

 

[Stillie]

Update:

Got an email asking for rica upon activation. Basically that means they will come install as long as i provide a certified copy of my I'D when the tech gets here.

I had a copy digitally so I emailed it to them and they were happy with that.

So far nothing regarding payment or lengthy forms to fill in.

So tech is coming on Thursday at 9am to activate my fibre line

So keen

 

[Hamish McPanji]

Thx for the update. Keep us posted

 

[Stillie]

Update

I got a call earlier saying that they will have to move the installation time to 11am due to having to get the stock from Pretoria. I am fine with that but I'm happy they called to let me know rather than let me wait till 11am wondering where they are.

 

[Stillie]

Final Update

Fibre installed all they had to do was come in with a router configure the ports at the switch downstairs, configure the router for username and password

Speedtest
9ms
9Mbps download
11Mbps upload
Cost R599pm on 12 month contract.

After the contract the A.P is mine

It's a TP link AC 750 dual band wireless ap

Super happy with the service and so far the connection

 

[Hamish McPanji]

That's good to know. I might opt in where I am as well. Might only use 9 months worth though, as will leave by September 2018

 

[Stillie]

That's good to know. I might opt in where I am as well. Might only use 9 months worth though, as will leave by September 2018

Just hang on either take the non contract option more expensive but I have been having issues since Friday rarely see speeds above 8Mbps and the support is not that great they open on Saturdays but I logged a fault the net went down and no one has replied as of yet

 

[Stillie]

Ok another Update:

Since getting Fibre on Thursday i have had 2 days (Thursday and Friday) of fantastic speeds, 9Mbps download and 10Mbps upload with 2 - 9ms pings.

Friday night every thing went downhill. Lost internet totally and with their Contact center times being Mon - Fri 8am - 10pm and Sat 1pm - 10pm I logged a call on the website and got a confirmation email. Now thinking that because they are open on Saturdays i will get contacted for my support request, but sadly nothing. So I saw that there was a SMS i can send "Directly to the tech support that is on standby" so i sent it Saturday afternoon and again on Saturday at about 11pm.

Sunday morning i wake up and the internet is still not working (No orange light, nothing, its dead as a door nail)

Sunday late morning i get a call from a tech saying there is a "General problem" and that the internet will be up sometime during the day. A couple hours later I get a call from the same tech (Im guessing it was a response to the second SMS now) and he said that they still working on the issue.

So i hang up and go about my day. In the afternoon i get a call from a different Tech who is actually working on the issue. He tries a few things and YAY i get a light on my router, not orange but blue which means i got internet (Rejoice!!!) run a speed test, 10 minutes later the speed test site finishes loading up. do a speed test and the results are awful. 0.4Mbps download and 10Mbps upload with a ping of around 8ms.



Ran it a couple times with very similar results. At one stage i had a 0Mbps download and 10Mbps upload with a ping of around 5ms (didnt know that was possible lol)

Anyway i have basically given up on the net at this time so i just leave it hoping that they fix it.

Wake up this morning to similar results as before so today i am hoping they get things sorted.



Since getting the fibre on Thursday, i have had 2 days of amazing speed and 3 days of little to no internet, its really frustrating and i dont know if its just a hiccup in their system just after i get fibre of if this is how it normally is (hoping its not the latter)

One thing i know is i have a slightly better understanding of how their fibre infrastructure is in the complex.

From what i have gathered by looking at the hardware while the tech was here on Thursday is that the fibre comes off the curb into a datacenter or something like that on the complex, then gets split up into fibre for each of the sections of the complex, which then runs to a managed switch, which then distributes the connection via LAN cable to each of the units. I dont know what implications this has on performance if any but i would imagine that it wouldve been better (but more costly) to run fibre to each of the units instead of Fibre -> DC -> Fibre -> LAN -> The unit.

So i will keep those that are interested up to date how things go with this issue i am currently having.

 

[Stillie]

Ok so some good news!

They have sorted the issue out and luckily i didnt have to come home to get it sorted. This is the constant speed i am getting now.



Thank goodness!

 

[Stillie]

ok i think this will be the last update, everything is running beautifully, the only grip i have is the upload fluctuates slightly between 6 and 10Mbps but im not too stressed about the upload